The present apparatus relates generally to a safety belt configuration for use in vehicles by passengers who are lying down.
Many vehicles are equipped with safety belts for restraining passengers within the vehicle during abrupt changes in velocity, such as collisions. Most vehicles are designed to carry passengers in a seated position with safety belts designed to restrain passengers in the seated position. Passengers that wish to lie on such seats much forego the safety of a safety belt. Several prior art attempts have been made to overcome this shortcoming in design. Several products are currently on the market which allow infants to sleep in a substantially semi-reclined fashion but are not designed to allow the infant to lie flat or to lie on his/her side. These products are not suitable for use by older children or adults because the child is displaced perpendicular to the length of the seat. In order to have room to lie down comfortably, adults and children must lie down along the length of the seat.
One attempt to provide a safety belt for a horizontal passenger in a vehicle is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,131,682 issued to R. Reed on Jul. 21, 1992, for a seat belt apparatus for sleepers. That patent discloses a single belt, similar to a lap belt, which is positioned transverse to the length of a bench-style seat, with the belt being designed to be worn around the midsection of the user. Also, beds in semi-tractors have been equipped with two safety belts arranged transverse to the sleeping surface which extend over the entire sleeping surface.
These arrangements have several shortcomings. First, the prior art restraints offer little or no protection against forces applied in a direction parallel to the longitudinal axis of the sleeping individual. Secondly, the prior art restraints have no mechanism which retains the belt or belts in a stationary position relative to the body of a sleeping passenger, allowing the restraints to migrate to vulnerable areas of the passenger's body, such as the neck, or to slip off the passenger entirely.